Trolling rods

[Chix_wing]

I will qualify my response by stating that I have only a couple of years trolling under my belt so my assessment may not be as mature as some of the more seasoned folks who hang out here. As already suggested, spend your money on the reels and go with inexpensive rods (<$50). As opposed to other styles of fishing where you have rod in hand and need to feel subtle strikes and all of the action happening under the water, choosing trolling rods is more about having those rod tips and angles consistent, and being able to manage the rods (how easily I can deploy, stow and store them). I prefer the one-piece or telescoping vs. two-piece rods, so that filters out a lot of choices. I currently run the BassPro/Cabela's DepthMaster 9" telescoping rods for my outside boards/dipsies and then Ugly Stik GX2 7' for the inside. I will probably move to all Ugly Stik 7-1/2' M/ML next year for consistency. The Ugly Stiks seem to be just powerful enough to handle pulling boards and divers, yet sensitive enough to give you a nice fight with the fish. And you can pick them up for $40 so you won't be too sad when one breaks.

[tater140]

Thanks for all of the suggestions. Yes I have some experience with cheap reals. I bougth the reels for my dad's boat a few years back and I think the initial reel I bought was the Okuma magda pro if I recall. It was their entry level reel and I had all kinds of trouble getting them to engage/disengage. After quite a bit of back and forth with Okuma I sent them into them for repair. They had them for a couple of months, and long story short with customer service experience that was not great they replaced them with the convector series of reel. Now with a few trips with them they are better but I do still have some trouble with the line counter not engaging on a couple of the reels. Nothing more frustrating then putting the line out and having to mess around 2-3 times to get the line counter to begin.

My big question would be the action and length of trolling rods. I think the rods I bought previously were a cabela's depthmaster rod of some type. I can't recall the length and action of them though. Is a medium action 7.5' rod enough backbone for the dipsey's? I'm sure there is a sweet spot in there between a good fighting rod and enough backbone to pull the dipsey's.